My current area of interest and exploration in terms of my personal process, and due to the nature of my work I find myself keen to bring into my own practice more consciously in time, is healing the impact of the trauma of our ancestors. And that indeed, not only what has happened to us in this lifetime can remain unhealed and somatised within our own bodies, but also what has happened to our ancestors.
I experienced this quite concretely for myself recently, beginning with the sensation of a deeply entangled knot of physical tension in my pelvis area, and through enquiry of its origins coming to a clear sense of my great grandmother’s abuse and murder during the holocaust. I cried what didn’t feel like my tears as I connected with her deep emotional pain and wounding, of course some of it was probably connecting in with my sense of empathy for what my great grandmother went through, yet I am clear this wasn’t all it was. Somehow I believe this trauma to have been passed down the family line.
I used EFT (Emotional Freedom Technique) as I released and processed intense emotions, memories and trauma of the most extreme kind, I am not clear if it was all related to my great grandmother or also her sisters, brothers, aunts, uncles – as Polish Jews all but my grandfather were killed there. I felt the new information that came through the enquiry and physical releases in my body were of sexual abuse that also occurred. Indeed for many years I have had bodily responses as if to rape and abuse that I feel I have never personally experienced- and this would help to explain what that has probably been about. Even as I sit here writing these words I can feel some intensity around it, and need for more healing and release, and vulnerability as to whether to expose this or not. I am a believer of honest and authentic sharing, yet I feel a need to do it right to honour my ancestors experiences in the most wise and heartfelt way I possibly can, I cry as I write these words.
In my latest personal EFT session I was working on fearful part about running EFT training and didn’t expect again to be going back to the holocaust, with a sense of ‘if I speak out I could die’ at the core of a slight fear and apprehension about speaking in groups – even though I have been doing it for years. Again emotion came up as I recognised where the fear came from, and my ancestor’s deep pain about not being able to speak out.
There is some science behind the idea that the trauma of our ancestors has been proven to affect our genes as documented in the recommended Horizon The Ghost in our Genes. Although I don’t think it’s all about genes, for me I am very open to the idea of an energetic connection between all human beings, but particularly those of our particular family system, and that what remains unhealed in a family effects the whole system. I think this is partly the aim of a therapy called family constellations. It is a system of therapy that usually takes place in a group, where the members of the group take the place of family members. During this process emotions and memories are brought to the surface for resolution and healing.
Of course you can do the same with EFT, using the tapping while connecting with your ancestors, or as I did enquiring into what remains unhealed in our own bodies and seeing where it takes us. Using EFT to release what comes up. This book Family Energetics explains more about how you can use EFT to heal ancestral issues, and is a great synthesis of EFT with family constellations.
So I encourage you, if you have deep pain, physical or emotional, that is persistent and not resolving with work you are doing on your own life experience, you may need to delve a little deeper, and explore that of your ancestors and heal what they never had chance to. Personally I can already feel deep shifts within me that I feel will ripple out into all areas of my life – my work, my relationships and my health.